Who do you trust and who trusts you? And what is practical if you have more than one pension?
Who assesses?
In the 'exemption from tax' issue, a discussion has taken place about the fact that the pension payer may make his own assessment when living outside the Netherlands. Practice shows that pension payers do not do this themselves.
Acting carefully means that one will first assess the place of residence and then the treaty provisions. This requires specialist knowledge, which a pension body does not have in-house as standard.
The Netherlands has concluded almost ONE HUNDRED treaties for non-residents. See here: www.taxdienst.nl Keeping track of all of them and the case law on this is a tough job. The International Professional Study costs 1.865 euros per year (plus VAT) for online knowledge; I'm just giving an example of the size.
There will probably be people who get the confidence from their pension payers that the country of residence and address they provide is correct. But when I look in practice, they are the exceptions that prove the rule. And that rule is simple: you are asked to obtain an exemption from the Tax Authorities. I think this promotes uniformity in checking your emigration and your new address. After all, you have to prove two things resp. make a strong case:
- You are living out of the Netherlands.
- Where do you live then?
You are living out of the Netherlands
Start proving that to your pension payer, X-Pensioenleven NV. As a pension payer, I would at least ask: do you own a house in NL, do you rent a house, are you registered/deregistered there, do you have a health care policy, do you have a means of transport, where do your wife/partner and children live, and perhaps much more.
How do you want to prove that, and also: do you entrust those sensitive matters to your pension payer? How knowledgeable are they to judge everything? In addition, there are people who say 'Why do you want to know that? None of your business, is it?' to have on the tongue.
The tax authorities already have this information on screen or on paper. They are legally authorized to do so, they have access to a ton of files.
X-Pensioenleven NV doesn't have all that, so go and deliver it from Thailand or another country.
You now live in Thailand
That's your story. But neither X-Pensioenleven NV nor the tax authorities can press a button for verification, so they will ask you for security and you can see what that is in the tax file; look up question 6. The evidence that has been submitted is only part of what has been achieved in practice.
Do you entrust X-Pensioenleven NV or the tax authorities with your personal data: passport stamps, purchases, school for your partner or children, means of transport, house book, bank book, and so on? Who would you choose?
If X-Pensioenleven refuses?
You have no appeal option whatsoever if X-Pensioenleven NV rejects your request and withholds wage tax! Excuse me; yes, you do. You can lodge an objection with … the Tax and Customs Administration! And it then starts to request exactly everything that you have already submitted to X-Pensioenleven NV and then makes its own assessment.
Conclusion
Practice shows that pension payers do not make that decision themselves. And that out of caution because of the many treaties, the risk of additional assessment by the tax authorities and the uncertainty whether you provide the correct address details.
After all, the instruction of the Tax and Customs Administration, which has been in existence for years, offers that FREE option. Hiring knowledge itself costs the NV money. And time. Because of their experience with my country of residence (more than 20.000 Dutch people in Thailand, not all of whom are X-Pensioenleven NV customers), I consider this to be the preferred method. Also for my privacy. I am sure that my personal details will be kept secret. So I opt for assessment by the tax authorities if I had to choose.
And that's what my pension payer also asks me to do; the only thing they judge for themselves is whether I'm still alive.
Finally
Now imagine that you have three or more pensions with different pension payers in addition to your AOW.
Erik, thank you for your explanation about pension payers.
Why is it that I cannot successfully sue the payer in question that it has not made a deduction and is still taxed by the tax authorities?
The tax deduction by the payer is purely intended to protect his customer against unpleasant surprises.
It is sufficient for the pension payer to simply inform his customer not to make any deductions, which also indicates that he/she alone is accountable to the tax authorities.
Ergo, it is not the pension payer's duty to check where his customer lives.
What matters to the pension payer is that the person is alive, nothing more.
And that is how my company pension fund acted.
Like Gerard, I would like to thank Erik for the article, but I also wondered why the Pension Fund, as Erik stated in his conclusion, would not dare to make a decision because of the risk of additional assessments by the tax authorities. After all, it is not a risk to the detriment of the Pension Fund, the risk of any additional assessment lies entirely with the pensioner. As a kind of comparison I would like to mention the following. A pensioner residing in the Netherlands must notify in advance whether or not he/she wishes to make use of tax credits. If he/she receives several benefits and he/she informs each benefit agency that the tax credits should be applied, a (severe) additional assessment by the Tax and Customs Administration will follow. However, both the SVB (AOW) and a Pension Fund do not check beforehand or afterwards whether the application of the tax credits has been declared to several benefit agencies, as they do not run any financial risk themselves. They merely point out to the beneficiary that it is unwise to have the tax credits applied more than once.
Gerard and Leo TH, my piece is about practice. An exemption is refused without a statement from the tax authorities. They play it safe.
Look at the reaction today under the article by Hans Bos: one of the pensioners living in Thailand asked and the answer is no.
The pension body has that choice. Moreover, the application to the tax authorities is the safest way and free. I think we have to live with that. We will have to apply for the statement in Heerlen and go through the procedure and how to do that - and especially how not to do it - has been discussed here repeatedly by tax advisors.
You must provide Roermond with proof that you actually pay tax in Thailand.
Send a copy of your tax number and a copy of your tax return form.
This is of course in Thai, so there are no questions about it
I don't know where you paid tax, but I received a receipt with my name, tax number and the amount paid - in English - on it.
Later I also received an income tax certificate RO21 and a certificate of residence RO22 via EMS.
The proof of registration is yellow and the receipt white and yellow.
If you got something else, you may not have paid tax, but a tax collector.
Why can't X-Pensioenleven do this?
At the transition to the health care policy, this was done by them and the amount already deducted was refunded!
Many of them know that they have been living abroad for a long time and have been deregistered in the Netherlands.
So it shouldn't be that difficult to spontaneously not withhold payroll tax
In my ABP pension, deduction of payroll taxes has been taken into account in the past year.????? Was still applying payroll tax credit yes and this was also stated on the annual statement.
I am a foreign taxpayer as a former civil servant and deregistered from the Netherlands and registered in Thailand. This is known to the ABP. So since January 1, 2015 I am no longer entitled to a deduction of anything. In my view, the ABP should therefore provide a correct gross-net statement and it is possible that I will now receive a supplementary payment from the tax authorities, although my calculation with the latest data resulted in almost the same amount of withholding tax and national insurance contributions???. I am aware that I can make a change myself through my ABP, but I remain of the opinion that the ABP should provide this as standard and should have the right knowledge in-house as my current lender.
Erik, thanks again for the interesting contribution and also thanks to the commenters for their comments.
I would therefore also like to know whether X-pension life is legally obliged to do payroll tax.
Hans van Mourik says
The ABP has given me a payroll tax credit for 2014.
In 2015, they did not give me a payroll tax discount on their own initiative, so my net income is lower.
The SVB gave me a tax credit for 2015 and 2016.
As a result, I received a provisional assessment for 2017 from the tax authorities.
On the advice of Eric Kuijpers, I have asked the SVB via my DIGID whether they no longer want to give my payroll tax credit for 2017.
On 23-01-2017 I noticed that they have now withheld payroll tax of 100.50 euros without payroll tax discount
I have already paid the provisional assessment, so for this year I basically pay too much tax.
But will get it back in 2018
Around Sept 2016 I also have to pay for 2016.
Hans
Hans says
I mean around Sep.2017 do I also have to pay extra for 2016.
Hans